Hermione Ruck Keene is a therapist in Totnes, Devon, and online


What attracted you to become a therapist?

I had thought about it on and off over the years, but began my training in earnest during the Covid pandemic – I was working as a music education lecturer teaching undergraduate students and became increasingly concerned about the mental health challenges they were facing. I started with a Foundation Certificate because I wanted to be able to support them better, and soon realised that I wanted to continue to train and work as a therapist. 


Where did you train? 

I did my training (Foundation Certificate, Postgraduate Diploma, and MA) at Regent’s University, London.


Can you tell us about the type of therapy you practise?

I’m trained to work both as an integrative and existential therapist, although I have more specialised training in the existential modality. I chose this advanced training because the existentialist approach allows for a client-centred way of working, focused on understanding each individual’s context and their connections with people and the world around them. 

I like the way existentialist therapy prioritises choice and agency, shining light on issues that clients are facing and helping them to see with them with fresh eyes. The way I work with each client is unique to them; I don’t try to apply techniques, theories or models to people but am with them as they explore their own world and whatever is currently troubling them within it. 


How does existential therapy help with symptoms of anxiety?

Existentialist therapy recognises that anxiety – along with other phenomena like death, isolation, choice and freedom – is a core part of being a human. 

Anxiety can sometimes present in a way that feels overwhelming and unmanageable. Rather than trying to simply change thinking patterns or theorize about why anxiety symptoms are happening, I will work with clients to contextualise their anxiety in the rest of their life (past, present, and future) and start to understand how anxiety shows up for them on a daily basis. 

Through this process of exploration, we can start to understand how factors beyond our control can shape our lives, and begin to see how we can exercise choice in our future decisions; and in doing so, our symptoms of anxiety find some relief.


What sort of people do you usually see?

I work a lot with younger people in the 18-30 age group, many of whom come to me because they are experiencing anxiety, a sense of confusion about who they are and what they want to do with their lives, or struggling with studies at university. 

I also work with performers and creatives; my previous career was in music education and I have worked in and around the classical music world for many years, which has given me lots of insight into problems that people working in these sectors might face, such as imposter syndrome, the pressures of an insecure working life and income, and loneliness. 

My third area of particular expertise is in working with neurodivergence, particularly autism, and I have supported clients who have recently received a diagnosis or are wondering whether they should seek one. 


Have you noticed any recent mental health trends or wider changes in attitude?

I have noticed the enormous impact of the pandemic on all the client groups I work with. For young people in particular, the combined impact of lockdowns, educational disturbance, the environmental crisis, and the financial context is often leading to a feeling of despair in the face of an uncertain future. 

Sometimes this shows up as symptoms of anxiety (particularly social anxiety) or depression; sometimes it just feels like an overwhelming sense of confusion and negativity about the future. I have found that talking through these feelings within the therapeutic relationship can really help people to feel less alone and find ways to reframe some of their thoughts and feelings.


What do you like about being a therapist?

It is an absolute privilege to sit with people as they find their way through challenges which may be temporary, or have deeper roots, understanding the world through their eyes, and seeing what matters to them. Watching people experience a moment of illumination as they realise that they can look at something in a different way and start to feel differently about it is incredibly rewarding. 

Perhaps strangely, it also feels like a huge privilege to sit with people in their sorrow, sadness or anger, and to hold a space of trustworthiness where they can show sides of themselves which might not feel safe to reveal in other parts of their lives.


What is less pleasant?

I want to say that it is unpleasant to hear some of the traumatic and abusive situations that people have had to endure, but I don’t actually think that it is – as I said above, it feels more like a privilege to be trusted with something that is held so close to someone’s heart. 

I think the thing I find the most difficult is when people have to stop attending therapy for reasons beyond their control; some of my work has been very short-term, when I was a volunteer counsellor in a university wellbeing service, and it felt hard to have to stop when some people had really just started to work through an issue. I hope though that even these brief experiences of therapy were enough to encourage people to return to therapy in the future. 


How long have you been with Welldoing and what you think of us?

I am a recent member of Welldoing; I joined because I like the way it is much more rigorous than some other online therapist matching services. Access to CPD through the service is also very useful. 


What books have been important to you in terms of your professional and personal development? Do you ever recommend books to clients?

I love reading and have a huge library of therapy books! Some favourites I come back to are How to be You: Simone de Beauvoir and the Art of Authentic Living by Skye Cleary, which is a very reader-friendly look at how existential philosophy can look in real life, and Irving Yalom’s books about existentialism. 

I’ve recently read Grief Works: Stories of Life, Death, and Surviving by Julia Samuel which I would highly recommend to anybody who has been bereaved or is supporting someone experiencing loss. 

 

What you do for your own mental health? 

I love being outside and in contact with nature, whether that’s through the daily walks I make sure I take, or out in my garden (particularly at this time of year when everything is starting to grow). 

I love to be creative in all kinds of ways – recently I’ve been taking pottery classes and learning to play gamelan. I’ve kept up with my music, despite changing career, and still sing regularly in a choir, which has all sorts of mental health benefits, and conduct a children’s choir, which lets me still have the joy of bringing music to young people, even though that’s not my job any more!


You are an online therapist. What can you share with us about seeing clients in this way?

I work online with clients from all over the UK – I really enjoy being an online therapist as I think it makes therapy so much more accessible and also means that I can keep my costs low. Offering affordable therapy is a real priority for me, as I am aware that most free or low-cost services don’t enable clients to choose their own therapist; as the relationship between me and my clients is absolutely central to my way of working, I think being able to choose to work with someone is both important and empowering. 

I am planning to offer face-to-face sessions in Totnes, Devon and in Fulham, London in the future. 


What do you wish people knew about therapy?

I know that most people are very nervous when they first start therapy; and sometimes they are so nervous about it that they don’t start at all. I wish they knew that they can take therapy at their own pace, that they can say if they feel uncomfortable (or angry, or frustrated, or anything else) and that I will listen and help them to work in a way that feels safe and comfortable for them. 

It’s important to challenge yourself and engage with therapy, but it shouldn’t feel overwhelming and although nerves are normal, taking the step to go with the nerves and try therapy anyway is one of the best choices you can make.


What did you learn about yourself in therapy?

I’m still learning about myself all the time – one of the things I love about being a therapist is that you have to have so much personal therapy yourself, which has pushed me to keep exploring and learning. I do really remember one of the first things I learned when I began attending therapy many years ago, which was that so many things I had made myself responsible for were not my fault, and had happened because of choices other people had made on my behalf. I found this so liberating – although I still have a tendency to take responsibility for too much!


Contact Hermione here

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